Beginner to Pro with ChatGPT in One Video!
About this video
Jeff Su maps a three-step journey for getting good at AI tools like ChatGPT and Google Bard: write good prompts, build a habit of applying them, then follow a learning plan to stay current. He notes he works full-time in tech but has zero coding experience. Beginner to intermediate: learn the six components of a strong prompt — task, context, exemplars, persona, format, and tone — in that order of importance: task is mandatory, context and exemplars are important, and persona, format, and tone are nice to have; not every prompt needs all six. He shows how a weak ’explain topic in simple terms’ prompt improves by adding a persona (a tenured college professor in economics), context (explain to a college freshman), and tone (8th-grade English). Intermediate: build the habit by picking a repetitive, must-do task and refining a prompt for it. His personal example: as a 70 kg male who trains five to six days a week, he asks for a push/pull/legs plan in table format, then refines it by adding an exemplar — a push day has five to six exercises for chest, shoulders, and triceps. His work example: a persona of a senior marketing manager with over 20 years of experience, summarizing a three-month email campaign that acquired 2,300 leads, only 80% of target, in under 200 words — then revised to add three areas for improvement, a confident tone, and no hashtags. Advanced: reduce friction using Thiago Forte’s idea of organizing prompts by where you’ll use them, not where you found them — saving newsletter prompts inside the Notion template where posts are drafted, using Gmail templates for recurring emails, and pinning the ChatGPT tab. For continuous learning he dedicates two hours a week to a free prompt-engineering course (he recommends learnprompting.org) and five minutes a day to an AI newsletter, stressing that consistency with one course and one newsletter beats hunting for the best ones.
Key takeaways
- A strong prompt has six components in order of importance: task (mandatory), context, exemplars (important), then persona, format, and tone (nice to have) — not all six are always needed.
- Build the AI habit by choosing one repetitive, must-do task and iteratively refining a prompt for it, adding exemplars when the output is structurally wrong.
- In Jeff’s work example, adding ’three areas for improvement,’ a confident tone, and ’no hashtags’ fixed a vague draft about a campaign that hit 2,300 leads, 80% of target.
- Organize prompts by where you use them (per Thiago Forte) — inside the Notion template, Gmail template, or app where the work happens — and pin the ChatGPT tab to cut friction.
- Stay current with two hours a week on one free prompt-engineering course (he recommends learnprompting.org) and five minutes a day on one AI newsletter; consistency beats finding the ‘best’ resources.
Episode details: published August 22, 2023 · 8:45 long. Summary written by Self Growth Videos from the episode itself. Business results and any income figures mentioned are Jeff Su’s own claims, shared for education — they are not typical or guaranteed.
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